Hidden Gems: Meet Sharon Oved of L’ovedbaby

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sharon Oved.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
One month before I became pregnant with my first child about 21 years ago, my mother, then age 46, was diagnosed with breast cancer. The news was devastating for me and my entire family. By the time little Arielle was born, I had heard and read extensively about the benefits of breastfeeding for both mom and baby. As such, I set a goal for myself to nurse my daughter and future babies until they turned one year old. Finding it difficult to do so discreetly in public, I created a nursing cover for my own personal use. Five years later, I began selling my nursing covers, and L’ovedbaby eventually evolved into a brand best known for our minimally-processes cotton baby clothing. Several years later, after much research, I discovered the added benefits of transitioning our Cotton Basics Collection to 100% certified ORGANIC cotton. Organic is not only safer for our little customers and the environment but equally important for the cotton farmers who suffer the risk of serious illnesses brought on by close contact with the many carcinogenic pesticides still used in conventional cotton farming today. Many of these farmers are parents themselves, and we want them to be around for THEIR little ones. So, we’ve taken this first step toward creating a better environment for everyone, and we truly appreciate that our loyal customers have joined us on this important journey.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Owning a business is one of the toughest but most rewarding things I’ve ever done. It’s almost like having a baby that you watch grow into adulthood. It’s a labor of love, but the challenges over the years are many. And you constantly question if you’re ‘doing it right’. I had no experience running a business and no fashion design experience. I’m an educator by trade and gave up my career as a teacher educator at UCLA to take a leap of faith that I could make L’ovedbaby a success. The nice thing is that I can make my own hours. The not-so-nice part is that my hours can sometimes be 24 hours a day, seven days a week. So, I might wake up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and suddenly see 50 texts on my phone from my factory overseas, asking me to make a major decision immediately because the factory is on hold while they await my reply. And at 3 in the morning, you don’t always make the smartest decisions!

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
L’ovedbaby is a 16 years old brand, best known for our tailored fit of baby and children’s organic cotton clothing. The only thing that surpasses our amazing quality of clothing is our excellent customer service. And my favorite thing about our business is still our loyal customers; seeing families grow in our brand over the years has been the most rewarding part of my job.

Is there any advice you’d like to share with our readers who might just be starting out?
It is extremely fun and exciting to see how far my business has come, but it’s a lot more work than I could have ever imagined. The most important thing I wish I would have done earlier is to set boundaries between work life and home life. When you run your own business, those lines are often blurred.

Pricing:

• Prices typically range from $5 to $36
• Adult sizes (for seasonal collections) range from $36 to $70

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: www.lovedbaby.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/lovedbaby
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/lovedbaby
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/lovedbaby

Image Credits
Jolie Molino photography